‘The Walking Dead’ Ends Season 10, for Now, With a Whisper

It feels like “The Walking Dead” has become “The Talking Dead” in the unexpected season 10 finale, “The Tower.” Maybe this is to accommodate the quirky new kid on the block, Princess (Paola Lazaro), who is Mighty Mouth with purple hair. Her superpower is chattiness and she is initially teamed with Ezekial and Eugene, her biggest competition in oratory prowess. The TV series is based on a comic book series and Princess is probably the only character who can crowd those two out of a panel by the mere volume of talk bubbles.

The giddy chatter is positively contagious. Carol (Melissa McBride) and Kelly have a heart to heart in a positively serene and homey setting, discussing how you never can really go home again. It’s okay Carol got Connie killed, it gives them something to talk about. Daryl (Norman Reedus), whose conversational minimalism is legendary, speaks volumes to Judith. Her father was his best friend, and tonight Daryl takes on a patriarchal mantle. Judith tells Daryl she was in contact with Michonne, but skips the details about a possible lead on Rick because she assumes she’ll be abandoned. Judith is a little reluctant to talk, which is understandable given the circumstances. The last person who lipped off to Daryl got an arrow through the head for her troubles. Judith still bites back some of her secrets because she saw what happens to people who mumble, much less whisper like the woman so unceremoniously dumped in a ditch. 

Even Beta gets gabby. Of course, the former country music star is speaking for two. Negan killed the top Whisperer, Alpha (Samantha Morton), on assignment from Carol, and her number two is talking out of both sides of his face now. His and the one on the half-mask he made from Alpha’s skin. She didn’t need skin to haunt Carol a few episodes ago and he is a man possessed. He is so comfortable in her skin the other Whisperers sometimes mistake the two. But don’t tell him that, he knows he is about twice her height while kneeling, and is very touchy about the attention. He is very zen, a man of few words, but he gets his point across well enough to lead a horde of zombies for a march on Oceanside. And what a horde. It’s probably the biggest gathering of undead amblers “The Walking Dead” has ever assembled. 

Director Laura Belsey allows the Walkers to overwhelm the point of view. This is especially effective when contrasted with Aaron (Ross Marquand) and Alden, hiding in the episode’s titular tower of an area hospital, mere feet away from Beta and his whispering lieutenants. They are the only characters who don’t really get to speak this episode. They spend most of it quietly tracking the horde.

Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) has always liked hearing himself talk, but never as much as he likes other people hearing him talk and he finds an impasse with Lydia. It seems like he can never say the right thing. Even his “Hey, sorry, I had to kill your mom, but I kinda liked her” bit only triggers the mommy issues which got her into this situation in the first place. We all wished you’d both died, she tells him, speaking for everyone else being driven out of Alexandria.

Polite conversations can be a minefield in any circumstance and, while “The Walking Dead” didn’t intend to end the season on a dangling participle, we don’t get the last word. That belongs to Princess who, after teetering between comic relief and tragic cautionary tale, brings enough sweets for the whole class. Eugene, when he first started out on this trek to find a possible friend, mentioned how it might be nice if the friend he made on the short-wave radio might have candy. It’s really all about the candy. “Tower” ends “The Walking Dead” on a sweet note and a bitter aftertaste. It appears the COVID-19 production robbed us of how Maggie (Lauren Cohan) will make her way back to the series, the original plan for the season’s end. But the forced break brings a low-level of unexpected subliminal suspense to the episode.

The Walking Dead” season 10, episode 15 aired Sunday, April 5 at 9 p.m. ET on AMC. The season’s finale episode will presumably air later this year.